Montgomery County will now require landlords to install window guardrails in dwellings where a child under the age of 10 is living, or where requested in writing by the tenant.

County Executive Marc Elrich signed the new law on Tuesday at a ceremony with County Council President Tom Hucker, Takoma Park City Councilmember Jared Smith, and tenant advocates who backed the measure.

“We have a lot of aging multi-family properties, and a lot of windows that present a hazard to young children,” Hucker said at the ceremony. “Window falls present a widespread hazard that needed to be addressed.”

Hucker noted that the number of injuries from windows falls treated at Children’s National Hospital has doubled during the pandemic, “presumably because schools and child care facilities have been closed for so long,” he said.

“As Tom said, far too many lives are lost in falls through windows,” Elrich said before signing the legislation. “It’s not something that happened only once, it’s happened multiple times… this is an ongoing problem.”

A racial equity analysis of the law found that it would particularly benefit Black, Latinx, and indigenous residents, all of whom are more likely to be renters than their white and Asian counterparts.

Under the new law, tenants in multi-family properties will be notified about their right to have a window bar installed by their landlord at multiple times during the rental process: as part of the original lease, in lease renewals, and in notifications of rent increases.

Hucker noted that frequent caregivers of young children, like grandparents or neighbors, can also request a window bar.

The bill, which passed the council unanimously in April, is named Ezechiel’s Law, after two-year-old Ezechiel Nguemezi, who died in Oct. 2020 after he fell out of a third-floor window in a Takoma Park apartment building.

“Ezechiel would have been three years old this past Sunday,” said Alvine Nguemezi, his mother, in a statement read by her sister at the signing. “My family considers the naming of the bill after Ezechiel an honor and future legacy to his short but memorable life.”

“Ezechiel was my only child. He was my baby, but also my companion. I miss him very much,” Nguemezi’s statement continued.

“None of us can imagine the pain you experienced,” Hucker said, speaking to Nguemezi and other family members at the signing. “I hope it provides a kind of comfort and resolution knowing that thanks to Ezechiel’s Law, no parent in Montgomery County should ever have to worry about a child falling from a window again.”

Nguemezi, Hucker and others expressed hope that the new regulations in Montgomery County could become a model for future legislation across the state of Maryland. Ezechiel’s Law will take effect next January.